wmplayer in process list on startup.

Soarer

Afternoon all.
My laptop (XPS1530) is a good bit slower on startup compared to when I first purchased it. Obviously this is down to software being installed and deleted, and I'll get around to trying to clean it up in the near future...with yere help!:o
Anyways, one of my big bugbears at the minute is Media Player. When I start the machine and check Task Manager, wmplayer.exe is running in the processes list. Becuase of this, when I double-click to open a video, it opens in the background and all I get is the audio. I have to close the process, and then when I double-click, it opens no problem.

Any ideas of how to stop it starting up automatically??

goodlad

Start -> run

Type "msconfig", click the startup tab and uncheck anything you dont want auto starting up including the mplayer.

Thats it sorted!

Karoma

Windows (XP) presumably?

Start -> Run -> msconfig -> Startup items --> Untick = "don't automatically start when Windows does" (It does not uninstall / remove software)
Reboot.


ED: bah.

Soarer

Tis actually Vista...shoulda probably said that at the start!:o

Anyways, gave that a try, and it's still there. Couldn't find anything that specified wmplayer.exe. There was one that said wmconfig.exe, and I unchecked that, but player still loaded.:(

goodlad

Thinking about it actually had this myself when i got my laptop a while ago.

Do you happen to have media sharing enabled on the laptop in media player?
If you do then that will kick in scanning for new devices which would start the wmplayer exe file as its part of media player.

The problem you describe i also heard before and it was because mini player option was enabled.

Also do you boot up with any external HDD connected or anything?
A lot of the time if one is detected during bootup the wmplayer.exe will start also as it detected media on the device.

Few possible causes there. Just throwing ideas out! hehe

PaddyTheNth

If goodlad's ideas don't sort it -

Autoruns gives an extremely comprehensive list of startup items (afaik its Vista compatible). Fire it up and have a search for WMP related items...do a Find for Media maybe and see what turns up.

If you still don't find out the cause of its startup get Process Explorer and see if wmplayer.exe is a child process of another one.

Soarer

Thanks for the replies guys.
@ goodlad: I think I have the media sharing option selected. Can't check now as I brought the laptop home at lunchtime. Will check when I go home.
@ PaddyTheNth: Thanks for the links. Will give them a good going over once I get home, whether goodlads suggestion works or not!

goodlad

Cool sure let us know how you get on.

And what PaddyTheNth is also a good option, twas actually the next thing i was going to suggest, hehe!

Sometimes another process starting might have a dependancy on media player and if it does then it will start up media player so it can run.

Good luck finding whats doin it!

Soarer

Got it sorted!:D

Used the programs linked above, and it turned out mediaplayer was a child process of some Dell Remote Control process.
Turned that off, without affecting the remote control, and all's well!

Thanks for all your help lads.